I hope you'll read this page before you go through any other information on Family Travel Photos.com. No, it's not because of some narcissistic impulse on my part. The reason you should know a little about us is so you understand where our opinions come from and can calibrate them with your own needs and priorities.
For example, if you're a 23 year old marathon runner, your perspective of what constitutes an "exhaustingly long walk" would be different than ours would be. If you listen to Country Music, you might be disappointed with our referral to a place with "wonderful music in the background" . . . if the music happens to come from a jazz trio or a string quartet. If you like the convenience of a large hotel and its staff, you might not appreciate our penchant for rental apartments and hotels.
You get the point. Before you take our opinions as gospel, you ought to know where our opinions come from.
With that in mind, I'm going to list out some things about us that influence our opinions and travel decisions.
So Who Are We?
Age
and Family - We are a late-40s married couple. When we talk about "family
travel" we are referring to 1) the two of us traveling alone, 2) the two
of us traveling with my brother, who is close to my age, or 3) the two of us traveling
with our two teen-age boys.
We Live in Fort Worth, Texas - We hearken from the land of big hair and the four-inch belt buckle, where our winters last about three weeks and our summers, eight months. As I type this, the temperture outside is 103 degrees. When I say it's cold outside, that could be anywhere up to 55 degrees (Fahrenheit). You northerners will probably scoff at me for that. Just like I laugh at y'all for complaining about hot days in the mid-80s. ;-)
We live in your standard suburban area so our perspective of an urban area will be different than you city dwellers. My wife is, at heart, a country girl but I'm totally domesticated.
People in Texas tend to commute larger distances than those in other parts of the country. It's nothing for us to jump in the car and drive 200 miles in a day; I have family in the Midwest who consider a 15 mile drive to be worthy of an overnight trip.
Mobility - My wife has greater mobility than I do. When we're on vacation, I still walk several miles a day so I'm very functional, but I do have boundaries. In some instances, my wife will go to places that I don't (other than the ladies' room, that is) - for example, she climbed the 400+ steps to get to the top of the Duomo and I cheerfully photographed her from the ground. That said, she has her own limitations . . . a few days after her Duomo climb, she decided she didn't need to walk up the stairs to the top of St. Peters at the Vatican.
All that's to say that physical exertion factors into our opinions and our choices for tourist attractions. If you're younger and/or more physically active, you can take our references to physical exertion with that in mind.
Photography and History - We are avid photographers, and a tourist attraction's photo policies influence what we think of it. I'm also a history buff and my wife is moving more in that direction every day. This also affects our decisions on the places we visit.
Food and Drink - Our family is comprised of unabashed carnivores. My wife likes some salads; my policy is that if it's green I probably won't eat it. If you're a vegan, our restaurant reviews probably won't help you much. We both enjoy drinking wine with our meals although neither of us knows anything about it.
Roughing It - Like I said, my wife is a country girl. She loves camping, wandering through the woods. My idea of roughing it would be staying in a hotel without Internet access. My wife enjoys fishing and nature photography. I enjoy fish sticks and looking at nature photography in magazines. My wife would love to climb around the Himalayan Mountains. I own a Himalayan cat. (Is the image of "Green Acres" coming to mind?)
Why Did I Create Family Travel Photos.com? I'm an information manager by trade, so I spend my days doing writing, photography, web design and development, search engine optimization (SEO) and desktop publishing. This is more than just work - I really love doing these things. This website is an extension of our vacations and an opportunity for me to do the things I enjoy. It's a lot of fun. Hey, I do website design as an independent contractor for companies all around the United States. If you like this site and want me to do yours, send me a note!
We're Tourists, Damnit! - I get weary of being browbeaten by travelers or TV shows who insist on dragging us away from the tourists to see the "real Venice" or "backdoor Europe" (a reference I'm a bit uncomfortable with, frankly.) There is a reason tourists go to the Coliseum in Rome, the Duomo in Florence, St. Marks Square in Venice, the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC . . . they're COOL PLACES. They're called "tourist attractions" because they, um, attract tourists.
I personally am not all that interested in seeing how "real Romans" live, any more than your average Roman would care about how I live. I'm on a vacation, not a sociological survey. If it comes to choosing between touring the Bargello Museum or watching a local make goat cheese at a shop his family owned since 1365, guess which one I'm picking?
I'm obviously having a little fun here. But I do notice the travel shows, and many of the chatters on traveler forms, tend to look down their collective noses at tourist attractions and hunt around for "a look into the lives . . ." more than I would. Samantha Brown, for example, went to Washington DC for her weekends show and didn't cover one traditional historical site - instead, she scooted us off to Sunday brunch at a transvestite restaurant. Learning more about the Capitol or the Washington Monument would have interested me; being served pancakes by a sassy cross-dresser just doesn't motivate me to visit the Federal City. (I must admit, my wife and I discussed taking our 16 year old boys to this place in DC without warning them, just to watch their reaction when the "waitress" came out from the kitchen. I know - we're evil.)
My wife and I love Rick Steves, Samantha Brown, Rudy Maxa and many of the other travel show series. And we understand that they have to come up with new content for the shows rather than just covering the same places other shows feature. Rick Steves hits a lot of the tourist sites and Samantha Brown visits some of them, between shopping and trendy bars and restaurants. I just think many of the shows could devote more of their time to the places people actually want to see, rather than focusing so much on local color.
It sounds like I'm picking on Samantha. I really enjoy her shows. I've seen every show she's done on European travel many times and learned quite a bit from her. I get a big kick out of her as well - she's got a terrific personality and she's a great sport. (I still laugh when I think of her running to the restaurant, carrying a big king crab that is completely skeeving her out.) She and I just have different priorities when it comes to restaurants, hotels and what to do on a vacation, that's all. So Samantha, if you're reading this - we love ya, enjoy your show and want you to do more stuff in Europe! I know you're from Dallas - Next time you're in the Metroplex, let's have lunch!
One last point, and then I'll get off the soap box. I challenge you to find a good travel video of Washington DC, Gettysburg Pennsylvania or any other U.S. destination that emphasizes the actual tourist attractions and was created in the last 30 years. We tried to find travel DVDs for Washington DC and they were really lousy, boring and appear to come from the Eisenhower era. I think there is a real market for good quality, modern travel videos that actually cover tourist attractions in domestic cities.
Hey Travel Channel, are you reading this??? We don't need TV shows that feature Miss Bodacious Boobs flopping herself around the beaches of the world. We don't need former jocks grunting around with macho men in other countries. And we sure as HELL don't need any more shows featuring morons swilling down the most nauseating animal parts they can find. Show me the places we can travel to and the reasons why people actually travel there. That is what we should expect on the Travel Channel.
Okay, I'm done now.